{"id":28685,"date":"2023-01-12T12:04:41","date_gmt":"2023-01-12T17:04:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/?p=28685"},"modified":"2023-01-12T12:04:47","modified_gmt":"2023-01-12T17:04:47","slug":"fiaf-presents-sixth-annual-animation-first-festival","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/fiaf-presents-sixth-annual-animation-first-festival\/","title":{"rendered":"FIAF Presents Sixth Annual Animation First Festival"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

New York, NY (January 12, 2023)<\/strong>\u00a0\u2014\u00a0The French Institute Alliance Fran\u00e7aise<\/strong>\u00a0presents the sixth edition of\u00a0Animation First<\/strong><\/em>, the only U.S. festival dedicated to French animation. The 2023 festival runs from Friday, January 27 through Sunday, January 29 and will present seven feature-length films (including four U.S. and three NY premieres), and six short film programs with over 65 new shorts. The complete\u00a0Animation First<\/em>\u00a0program will comprise filmmaker conversations, three “Work in Progress” presentations, a selection of video games and AR-VR experiences, and student shorts programs.\u00a0Animation First<\/em>\u00a0curators are Delphine Selles-Alvarez, FIAF Film Curator, and Chlo\u00e9 Dheu, FIAF Film Coordinator.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Opening the festival on Friday, January 27 will be the NY premiere of Amandine Fredon and Benjamin Massoubre’s Little Nicholas: Happy As Can Be<\/strong><\/em>. Little Nicholas<\/em> is a charming rendition of artist Jean-Jacques Semp\u00e9\u2019s and Ren\u00e9 Goscinny\u2019s lives which co-exist within the fictitious adventures of Le Petit Nicolas<\/em>, the beloved French children’s character. The film is being presented in conjunction with the FIAF Gallery exhibition:<\/strong> Signature Semp\u00e9<\/a>.<\/em> The exhibition will consist of a selection of Semp\u00e9\u2019s most iconic works, including quintessential drawings from Le Petit Nicolas<\/em> and New Yorker<\/em> cover designs that will be on view during the festival and through April 7 in the FIAF Gallery. Additionally, there will be a conversation with the Little Nicholas<\/em> filmmakers, gallerist Martine Gossieaux, and New Yorker<\/em> artistic director Fran\u00e7oise Mouly examining the allure and longevity of Semp\u00e9 and Le Petit Nicolas<\/em> on January 28.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Animation First 2023<\/em> Guest of Honor is award-winning screenwriter and director, Anca Damian<\/strong>. Damian will present the NY premiere of her mixed media animated film, The Island<\/em><\/strong> (The Island<\/em> was an Animation First 2021 \u2018Work in Progress\u2019 presentation) on Sunday, January 29. Following the screening, there will be a conversation with Damian where she will discuss her new film and the augmented reality companion piece, In Search of Paradise<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The closing night film on Sunday, January 29 will be the U.S. premiere of Alain Ughetto’s stop motion feature,\u00a0No Dogs or Italians Allowed<\/strong><\/em>. Told as a fictional dialog between the filmmaker and his grandmother, the film details the lives of Italian immigrants who fled poverty and fascism. Other 2023 feature films include the NY premiere of Alberto V\u00e1zquez’s\u00a0Unicorn Wars<\/em><\/strong>, an anti-war allegory; the U.S. premiere of Michael Ocelot’s\u00a0The Black Pharaoh, the Savage and the Princess<\/em><\/strong>, three tales celebrating courage in the face of injustice; the U.S. premiere of Pierre F\u00f6ldes’\u00a0Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman<\/em><\/strong>, based on short stories by Haruki Murakami, and recently added directors cut of the 1987 film,\u00a0Gandahar<\/em><\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This year’s festival will include six short film programs: Best of Annecy<\/em><\/strong>, Best of Annecy Kids<\/em><\/strong>, New Francophone Shorts<\/em><\/strong> programs, Student Shorts Competition<\/em><\/strong> and RECA<\/em><\/strong>, the French Animation School Network. There will also be three \u2018Work in Progress\u2019 presentations for 2023: Sepideh Farsi’s The Siren<\/strong><\/em>, Chiara Malta & S\u00e9bastien Laudenbach’s Chicken for Linda<\/strong><\/em>, and artist C\u00e9dric Babouche and producer Aymeric Castaing’s video game Dordogne<\/em><\/strong>. Throughout the festival, the FIAF Library will be free and open to the public to experience video games and virtual reality films from French studios and distributors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The complete Animation First 2023<\/em> schedule can be found here<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

About Animation First<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Created in 2018, Animation First<\/em> is the only film festival in the United States dedicated to French animation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today, France is Europe\u2019s largest producer and the world\u2019s third-largest exporter of animated film. Since its beginnings in the late 19th century when \u00c9mile Reynaud projected his Pantomimes Lumineuses at the Mus\u00e9e Grevin in Paris, the French animation industry has inspired filmmakers and artists. Their resulting experiments with puppets, cutouts, and stop motion, have been instrumental in inventing important techniques in cinema. Renowned for its stylistic innovation and an approach that integrates artisanal methods with technological ingenuity, French animation continues to garner awards worldwide and spans a diversity of genres. It is responsible for a variety of films from independent art-house successes such as Sylvain Chomet\u2019s The Triplets of Belleville<\/em> and Michael Dudok de Wit\u2019s The Red Turtle<\/em> to those for mature audiences like Persepolis<\/em> and I Lost My Body<\/em> to the Franco-American Despicable Me<\/em> franchise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Beyond films, France has carved out an important space in animated TV programs, web series, video games, and the rapidly developing fields of virtual reality and new technologies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

New York, NY (January 12, 2023)\u00a0\u2014\u00a0The French Institute Alliance Fran\u00e7aise\u00a0presents the sixth edition of\u00a0Animation First, the only U.S. festival dedicated to French animation. The 2023 festival runs from Friday, January 27 through Sunday, January 29 and will present seven feature-length films (including four U.S. and three NY premieres), and six short film programs with over […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":77,"featured_media":28686,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"off","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-28685","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28685","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/77"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28685"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28685\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28686"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28685"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28685"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28685"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}